In certain situations, it is desired to be able to lock the door or doors of a household refrigerator to prevent food from being taken therefrom by unauthorized persons. In addition to the door being capable of being locked, the door must be capable of being opened and closed without interference by the locking arrangement when the door is not locked.
While it has previously been suggested to lock the door of a home food freezer, the relatively large thickness of the wall of the food freezer has enabled a locking arrangement to be utilized without having any effect on the appearance of the inner liner of the door or without producing sweat on the outer case or wall of the door. However, this locking arrangment cannot be satisfactorily utilized with a household refrigerator cabinet because of the wall of the household refrigerator cabinet being relatively thin.
Specifically, if the locking arrangement utilized with the door of the home food freezer were to be employed in a refrigerator cabinet, it is likely that a catch for the door lock latch would be located in the breaker strip of the refrigerator, requiring a relatively large cutout area in the inner liner of the door. This would produce a number of problems. First, stresses would be produced in the plastic door liner in the vicinity of the cutout. This could lead to premature failure. Secondly, the appearance of the refrigerator door inner liner would be affected. Thirdly, increased thermal leakage could lead to condensation ("sweat") forming on the outer wall of the door. Therefore, the type of locking arrangement employed with a home food freezer in which the breaker strip has a catch cannot be satisfactorily utilized with a household refrigerator.
The present invention satisfactorily solves the foregoing problems through providing a locking arrangement for a household refrigerator cabinet in which the necessity of forming any cutout area in the inner liner of the door is avoided. This greatly reduces the possibility of sweat formation on the outer wall of the door and does not have any effect on the appearance of the door.
The present invention accomplishes this through providing a unique locking arrangement having a latch mounted on the door exterior of the compartment sealing means and a catch mounted on a wall of the refrigerator cabinet exterior of where the sealing means on the door engages the cabinet. Thus, there is no large cutout area formed in the inner liner of the door and there is no possibility of sweat formation on the outer wall of the door.
The latch of the present invention is mounted on the door so that it is retracted within the door whenever the door is unlocked. This avoids any possibility of the latch damaging the cabinet when the latch is in its unlocked position.
Additionally, in household refrigerator cabinets of the two-door type, the alignment of each of the doors is critical. Thus, after the two doors have been properly aligned, it is necessary for any latch and catch of a locking arrangement to be properly aligned.
The present invention meets this requirement through mounting the catch on the end wall of the cabinet so that the catch can be moved in both the horizontal and vertical directions prior to being fixed in position. This enables proper location of the catch irrespective of the position to which the door is moved to produce correct alignment.
Furthermore, the household refrigerator cabinet of the two-door type also requires an anti-sweat heater wire in a return flange at the edge of the outer case of the cabinet. Therefore, since this heater wire is at the edge of the cabinet adjacent the location of the catch, it is necessary that the catch be capable of being mounted without damaging the heater wire, particularly by the mounting screws.
The present invention meets this requirement through utilizing a unique nutstrip to receive the screws mounting the catch on the cabinet. The structure of the nutstrip prevents the screws from engaging the heater wire. At the same time the nutstrip enables the screws to extend into the return flange, if desired.
An object of this invention is to provide a locking arrangement for a household refrigerator door which does not require any holes or cutouts in the door inner liner.
Another object of this invention is to provide a catch of a locking arrangement capable of being adjustably mounted.
This invention relates to the combination of a refrigerator cabinet including a compartment having an opening, a door mounted on the cabinet for closing the opening, at least one of the door and the cabinet having sealing means to seal the opening when the door closes the opening, and locking means to lock the door to the cabinet. The locking means includes a latch mounted on the door, means to move the latch between locked and unlocked positions, and catch means mounted on the cabinet exterior of the location of the sealing means when the door closes the opening with the catch means cooperating with the latch to lock the door to the cabinet when the moving means moves the latch to its locked position.